This is Round 1 in our Worst Company in America contest, Comcast vs Menu Foods. One company kills pets. Another kills file sharing. Which is the greater crime? The wisdom of the internet will decide.
See the master bracket of all the companies here.
worst company in america
Announcing The Worst Company In America 2008 Contestants
By 3.11.08
Your votes are in and we have seeded the initial brackets for Worst Company In America 2008. It’s bigger, the companies are badder, and the bloodshed and gore is going to better than ever before. Inside, see the full bracket breakdown. Tomorrow, the first battle begins, Comcast vs Menu Foods!
By 3.9.08
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Rumor has it that the RIAA is plotting to steal from anyone who has ever illegally downloaded music a single hour of sleep early Sunday morning. Adjust your clocks accordingly.
Worst Company In America 2008: Preliminaries: Frontrunners
By 2.27.08
Early leaders in Worst Company in America 2008 preliminary voting round: Comcast 21%, Best Buy 8%, Bank of America 5%, Fox News 5%, Walmart 5%, Countrywide 4%, Verizon 3%, AT&T 3%. Somewhere in our heart is a flicker of hope that dark horse Video Professor will pull into the running (currently with 0% of the vote). Voting for who gets to be seeded in the tournament brackets is still open, cast yours today.
Worst Company In America 2008: Preliminaries (2nd Try)
By 2.27.08
The poll machine is fixed and it’s time to vote on which companies will get to compete in Consumerist’s Third Annual Worst Company In America contest. This year, you nominated 121 different companies, a new record. The poll is inside (it may take a few seconds to load). You get one vote. The companies receiving the most votes will get seeded in a tournament-style bracket. Then the clash of the customer service midgets begins! Remember that as this contest goes on you can visit consumerist.com/tag/worst-company-in-america to keep track of all the proceedings.
Worst Company In America 2008: Preliminaries
By 2.26.08
It’s time to vote on which companies will get to compete in Consumerist’s Third Annual Worst Company In America contest. This year, you nominated 121 different companies, a new record. The poll is inside. You get one vote. The companies receiving the most votes will get seeded in our March Madness-style brackets. Then the clash of the customer service midgets commences! Note: because there’s 121 companies, the poll may take some time to load.
Worst Company In America '08: Nominate
By 2.14.08
It’s time for Consumerist’s 3rd Annual Worst Company in America Contest! Last year, RIAA won. Before that, Halliburton took the prize. Who will climb to the top of the nadir this year?
By 1.21.08
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RIAA website hacked. Over the weekend, some hacker-types took it upon themselves to delete the RIAA’s website. [TorrentFreak]
Sony BMG Will Drop DRM
By 1.4.08
In a move that would mark the end of a digital music era, Sony BMG Music Entertainment is finalizing plans to sell songs without the copyright protection software that has long restricted the use of music downloaded from the Internet, BusinessWeek.com has learned. Sony BMG, a joint venture of Sony (SNE) and Bertelsmann, will make at least part of its collection available without so-called digital rights management, or DRM, software some time in the first quarter, according to people familiar with the matter.
MP3s You've Ripped Yourself Are Still "Unauthorized" By The RIAA
By 12.11.07
Atlantic v. Howell is a bit unusual because the defendants, husband and wife Jeffrey and Pamela Howell, are defending themselves against the recording industry’s lawsuit without the benefit of a lawyer. They were sued by the RIAA in August 2006 after an investigator from SafeNet discovered evidence of file-sharing over the KaZaA network.
Congress Wants To Up Copyright Infringement Penalties
By 12.7.07
The usual gang of RIAA-funded suspects have introduced a bill that would boost US intellectual property laws and the penalties that go along with them, and allow the U.S. government to seize computers, says Ars Technica.
Walmart Hates DRM
By 12.3.07
Ars Technica says that Walmart has given an ultimatum to “some of the largest record labels, including Warner Music Group and Sony BMG Music Entertainment, to provide more of their respective music catalogs in MP3 format (that is, without DRM) next year.”
EMI To Cut Funding To RIAA And Other Trade Groups?
By 11.29.07
Ever wonder why the big labels waste money funding trade groups like the RIAA? EMI, the British record company that was recently taken over by a private equity firm does, and a unnamed source tells Reuters that the new investors are thinking of cutting funding to the RIAA and other, similar trade groups.
Is The RIAA Afraid Of Harvard?
By 11.27.07
Of all the Ivy League schools, Harvard is the only one to have escaped the deluge of RIAA pre-litigation letters. What gives?
New Bill Would Cut Financial Aid To Schools Who Don't Police P2P, Sign Up With Napster
By 11.12.07
Ars Technica is reporting that there is a provision in a massive new education bill that would punish schools that don’t police p2p traffic on their networks by cutting federal financial aid. In addition, the bill requires that schools offer an industry approved alternative to file sharing, such as Napster or Rhapsody.
RIAA Defendant: Best Buy Replaced My Hard Drive During Warranty Repair
By 11.5.07
The RIAA defendant who lost her jury trial, Jammie Thomas, is telling her side of the story on p2pnet. Of particular interest: She claims that Best Buy made the decision to replace her hard drive, under the terms of her extended warranty, 6 months before she was served with the RIAA’s subpoena.
NIN's Trent Reznor Shared Files On OiNK, Compares iTunes To Sam Goody
By 10.31.07
Trent: I’ll admit I had an account there and frequented it quite often. At the end of the day, what made OiNK a great place was that it was like the world’s greatest record store. Pretty much anything you could ever imagine, it was there, and it was there in the format you wanted. If OiNK cost anything, I would certainly have paid, but there isn’t the equivalent of that in the retail space right now. iTunes kind of feels like Sam Goody to me.
By 10.11.07
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First Radiohead, then NIN and now Madonna is said to be dumping her record label, Warner Music. [Bloomberg]
